Fishermen typically prefer to have a number of Locations in which to fish so that if fish are not striking in one location, the fishermen can move to others until they find one where the fish do strike. If the fishermen are in boats, they have a wide choice of locations while if they are fishing from shore they have a more limited choice, but they can still move if fishing from one location proves fruitless. Ice-fishing however is another matter. Extensive preparations are necessary before an ice fisherman can begin to fish. He must usually erect an enclosure to protect himself from the wind, sleet and snow, he must provide heat in the enclosure if the weather is very cold, he must drill a number of holes in the ice and so on. Once the ice fisherman has completed his preparations, he cannot move without a great deal of inconvenience. He must undo the preparations he has already made at his present location and repeat them at a new location. A great deal of time is required for him to do so and in practice once he has set up at one location he does not move.
To increase the odds of catching fish while ice fishing, fishermen will spread their lines out as far possible to cover a wide area. To do so, they will install an un-manned tip-up outside the enclosure and remain in the enclosure and fish from there while keeping their eye on the tip-up. Ice-fishing is best at dawn and dusk at a time when the light is dim or there is total darkness. At such time, a tip-up is very difficult to see even when it is not more than 10 feet from an enclosure. Blowing snow and fog may also contribute to limited visibility. Lanterns may be used to illuminate the tip-up but they draw heavily from a battery since they must remain on continuously. In cold weather, batteries generally perform poorly and the light from a lantern that remains continuously on becomes dim in a relatively short period of time.
Tip-ups that are commercially available have various means for overcoming this problem. One such tip-up has a pin which is released when the device is activated by a strike. When the pin is released, a siren sounds and lights flash. However the pin can become frozen in cold weather and not release at the time of a strike. Other known tip-ups continuously draw from a battery which soon runs down in cold weather. Still others delay the sounding or displaying of a signal when a fish has struck the bait.
In general, the effectiveness of most of the tip-ups that are commercially available falls off in cold weather when they are exposed to adverse weather conditions. Freezing rain, snow and ice can form around the release points of signals such as flags, sirens and lights and prevent the devices from reacting when there is a strike. On occasion, winds can set off the devices as can small fish which may nibble at the bait and cause the tip-ups to react. Until the devices are re-set, they do not react later when there is a genuine strike.